SINGAPORE, Sept. 23 -- Three months ago, Maja Chwalinska had no hotel room at Roland Garros. Her management team booked it two days before she arrived, when she was still ranked outside the world's top hundred and her name meant nothing to the tournament's press office. She won nine consecutive matches to reach the French Open final as the first qualifier ever to do so, walked onto Court Philippe-Chatrier as the lowest-ranked finalist in the tournament's modern history, and lost to Mirra Andreeva 6-3, 6-2.

On Monday at the Kallang in Singapore, Chwalinska was the one who won in 79 minutes. Rebecca Sramkova, ranked 146th, fell 6-4, 6-2 in a first-round match at the Singapore Tennis Open presented by BNP Paribas, a result that told the sto...